If you like folklore and legends--and have even a passing interest in ghosts or ghost investigation--check out my appearance on Mark Norman's always-excellent "Folklore Podcast!" We discuss the (often unrecognized) role of ghostlore in modern ghost hunting, where ghost hunters go wrong, and much more!
You can listen HERE!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“Finally! A textbook of investigation technique that comes at the subject from a sensible, scientific perspective without being patronizing. Radford employs his years of experience and knowledge to fine effect. Forget EMF meters and voice recorders. The only thing you need in your toolkit is this book.”
--Mark Norman, author of Black Dog Folklore and creator of The Folklore Podcast
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“Radford pulls no punches as he investigates paranormal investigations, from popular TV series to famous self proclaimed investigators throughout history. He breaks down the pseudoscience of what we call the ‘paranormal’ and tries to look past the glitz and glamour of the current popularity and find something, anything that provides proof of the existence of ghosts.”
--Dave Schrader host of BEYOND the DARKNESS and Coast to Coast AM
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“With a proliferation of popular TV shows which actively promote ghost hunting as an adventurous past-time Investigating Ghosts is an essential handbook for anyone wishing to go ‘beyond the armchair’ and investigate suspected paranormal activity. The emphasis this book places on explaining the need for properly scientific research and for genuinely analytical thinking will be invaluable to enthusiasts and to sceptics and debunkers alike—to everyone, in fact, who hopes to collect reliable evidence, and especially therefore to paranormal investigators who don’t wish to have wasted their own time. As Ben Radford points out, ghost hunting has been both popularized and democratized by the increased availability of electronic recording and monitoring technology, and, while many people might think of ghost hunting as a reasonably safe past-time, Investigating Ghosts alerts investigators to potential risks and pitfalls, including the risk of investing too much in technology, when, as the book says, the most important investigative tools aren’t electronic gadgets but a sound understanding of scientific principles and the possession of a questioning mind.”
--Joe Banks, author of Rorschach Audio
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“An informative read, this book is a must read for not only those who intend to investigate the paranormal but also for those who already do. Radford offers an up-to-date overview of the field of paranormal research in a way that demonstrates what good, rational research methods are alongside examples of how ghost research can (and does) go terribly wrong. Radford passes on useful and accurate information about how to be a good investigator in an easy-to-understand way, while also recommending a variety of other sources that will help people easily gain a deeper understanding of the research relating to this field. Ghost hunters may pick this book up and feel affronted as it tackles behaviours and methodologies that they employ, but it does so in a manner that isn’t dismissive and, hopefully, will help people reflect on the error of their ways. If people only choose to read one book about how to investigate ghosts this is the one—it’s got all you need to know!
--Hayley Stevens, paranormal researcher and blogger
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“This is without doubt the most comprehensive book on ghost investigation that I have read. It is written in a lively style that will engage the reader from start to finish. It should be read by everyone with an interest in paranormal claims—and perhaps especially by those ‘paranormal investigation teams’ that grace our TV screens night after night with their sensationalistic and totally unscientific approach to ghost investigation.”
--Prof. Christopher C French, Head of the Anomalistic Psychology Research Unit, Department of Psychology, University of London
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“Interested in the reported phenomena of ghosts and serious research into paranormal claims? Don’t count on TV shows for your paranormal knowledge. You’ll be misled about the critical concepts of investigation. Investigating Ghosts can open the eyes and minds of today’s paranormal investigators—if they dare to look. A comprehensive review of ghost hunting techniques, this volume describes the best practices of investigation that lead a useful result. Radford drills down into the modern approach to investigating haunting claims and how to correct it, covering the spectrum of viewpoints in this well-referenced volume.”
--Sharon A. Hill, Science and society specialist and founder of Doubtfulnews.com
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“This book presents a combination of the excitement and emotional tingle typically provided by ghost stories, a critical analysis of the reliability and scientific value of such accounts, an explanation of how ghost experiences can occur even if ghosts do not exist, and a prescription for how any future ghost research should properly be conducted. The author is an open-minded skeptic on the subject, and ghost hunter and skeptic alike will learn from his clear-headed analysis. This book is highly recommended both for anyone with a serious interest in ghostly phenomena and for readers who simply enjoy reading about ghosts.”
--Prof. James Alcock, PhD, Department of Psychology, York University
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“A great book. Benjamin Radford is one of those rare individuals who devote time, competence and passion to the scientific investigation of unusual claims. It would be much easier and profitable to follow the tide and support the supernatural and other unlikely events. The fact that Ben prefers to go against the flow is a testimony to his honesty.”
--Massimo Polidoro, psychologist and author of Final Séance and Secrets of the Psychics
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“With the plethora of television programs, websites, and books on ghost hunting today, Benjamin Radford takes a timely and welcome look at the field, and sets out clear, practical guidelines for would-be ghost hunters. This enjoyable and informative book is no-nonsense in its approach and is informed by the history, folklore, and psychology of ghost belief. Neither skeptic nor believer, Radford argues for a meticulous and sober approach to investigating hauntings.”
--Owen Davies, University of Hertfordshire, author of The Haunted
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Over the new week or two I'll be posting some blurbs and reviews of my new book Investigating Ghosts: The Scientific Search for Spirits. It is currently available as an e-book at Amazon.com and will be available in print in a few weeks (preferably at your local independent bookstore!).
“In the growing literature of scientific and historical examinations of fringe and paranormal practice, this book stands out. Benjamin Radford lays out in detail how ghost hunting should be done. If we are lucky, some of this might sink in.”
---Brian Regal, Kean University, author of Searching for Sasquatch: Crackpots, Eggheads, and Cryptozoology.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Santa brought me a great gift:
A nice review of my book in a prominent folklore journal: "Bad Clowns is a thorough, useful survey of the history of bad, creepy, and evil clown narratives and imagery, and one that could prove a timely and accessible teaching text for undergraduate courses on contemporary legend, folklore and popular culture, or folklore and media. Bad Clowns does an outstanding job of querying why clown imagery has come to be associated with fear, crime, and violence... Ideas involving the uncomfortable intersection of childhood with adulthood, the catharsis of chaos, and the idea of a clown as a magnified cultural mirror – lurk deeper. For these questions alone, the book is worth a read."
You can read the rest HERE.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

This scene from 1600s New England depicts the use of a “courting stick,” by which young lovers could exchange whispers and sweet nothings in some privacy despite the entire family living in one room. What do you think this lad is saying to his sweetheart?
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

I've been a huge fan of Warren Zevon for decades, and was fortunate enough to see him live a few times (and even got his autograph on a photo I took of him). Known as a highly literate songwriter, he had many books and writer friends. I learned he was dying shortly before my first book came out, and I dedicated that book to him. I also sent him a signed copy of that book, and was told by his agent he received it. I have no idea if he read it, but he likely at least looked at it--when he wasn't recording his final, Grammy-winning album "The Wind." Zevon's book collection was sold, and I wonder if mine is among them. That would be cool.

A decades-old murder in one of the strangest clown-related mysteries in history may have been solved.
I wrote about this case in my 2016 book Bad Clowns...
It happened in West Palm Beach in the spring of 1990 when a woman named Marlene Warren heard a knock on her door at 10:45 in the morning on May 26. She opened the door to find a whitefaced clown wearing a bright red nose and an orange wig. The clown greeted Warren with a wordless nod and handed her a basket of red and white carnations, along with two silver balloons. As Warren looked down at the gifts she was receiving, the clown pulled out a gun and shot her once point-blank in the mouth with either a .38 or a .357.
According to Warren's son Joseph, who saw the shooting, the clown had brown eyes and wore Army boots. The clown escaped in a white Chrysler LeBaron, which was later reported stolen and discovered abandoned. Warren died two days later in the hospital. Detectives at the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office suspected her estranged husband Michael Warren of plotting the murder, along with a brown-eyed, brown-haired woman who worked for him repossessing cars for Mr. Warren's auto dealership.
According to The Gainesville Sun, "A woman matching the description of Sheila Keen, 27, bought a clown costume, makeup, an orange wig and a red clown nose two days before the murder, according to two West Palm Beach costume store clerks who tentatively identified Keen's photo from police files. Then, on the morning of the murder, a woman fitting Keen's description purchased two balloons and a floral arrangement at a Publix supermarket less than a mile from Keen's apartment, according to sheriff's documents... The balloons and flowers match those left at the scene of the murder, according to the documents. Neighbors at Keen's apartment complex in suburban West Palm Beach said they frequently spotted Michael Warren, the dead woman's husband, at the complex, according to police reports."
Both Mr. Warren and Keen denied any involvement, either romantically with each other or in the death of Warren's wife. Keen claimed that she was out looking for cars to repossess at the time Mrs. Warren was shot. News of the killer clown shook the West Palm Beach community, and a news report dated a month after the shooting noted that "local adults and children are now apprehensive of businesses that employ [clowns]. ‘Unfortunately, children are only hearing the negative side,' said Yvonne (Sunshine the Clown) Zarza, owner of Balloons Above the Palm Beaches. ‘Normally, it's Don't go near a stranger. Now parents are saying, Don't go near clowns.'"
Warren stood trial in 1992 on 66 criminal counts of fraud, racketeering, and grand theft related to his business; on August 8 of that year he was convicted on over three dozen counts of fraud, grand theft, and petty theft.
For decades no one was arrested or charged in the death, but earlier this week that changed: According to CBS News, "Police in Florida say they've arrested a woman accused of dressing up like a clown 27 years ago and fatally shooting the wife of her future husband. A Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office news release says 54-year-old Sheila Keen Warren was arrested Tuesday in Virginia. A Florida grand jury recently indicted her on a first-degree murder charge." News reports suggest that DNA evidence led to Mrs. Warren's arrest, though it's not clear what items were recovered at the crime scene that would implicate Warren.
There are a few other clown-related killings, such as those by John Wayne Gacy and the 2002 assassination of Mexican drug lord Felix Arellano.

You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

The emailed press release I got last week began:
"PETERSBURG, Ky., Sept. 26, 2017 - Since Darwin's ‘On the Origin of Species' was published in 1859, entirely new fields of science have been born and matured-fields which hold the keys to the origin of species. With a Ph.D. in cell and developmental biology from Harvard, Dr. Nathaniel Jeanson is uniquely qualified to investigate what genetics reveals about origins, and has released his findings in the book ‘Replacing Darwin: The New Origin of Species.' Due from Master Books next month, ‘Replacing Darwin' offers a revolutionary approach to the study of origins with a potential impact as big as Darwin's."
It certainly sounded potentially intriguing, so I kept reading:
"'On the Origin of Species' is considered one of history's most influential books and has become the foundation of evolutionary biology. This new work asks readers to consider: If Darwin was looking at the same evidence today using modern science, would his conclusions be the same? ‘Since 1859, we've had time to reevaluate [Darwin's] picture. A global community of millions of scientists can pool their resources and build on one another's work,' Jeanson states. ‘The cumulative observations of these scientists have built an unprecedented body of knowledge on the diversity and operation of life.' In ‘Replacing Darwin,' Jeanson argues that this knowledge has rewritten the long-standing explanation for the origin of species. Though a work of scholarship, ‘Replacing Darwin' is accessible. Jeanson uses an analogy to which all readers can relate - a jigsaw puzzle - to illustrate the quest for the answer to the mystery of the origin of species. He contends that Darwin reached his conclusions with only 15 percent - or less - of the total pieces of the puzzle. In addition, Jeanson argues that Darwin tried to piece together his findings without the constraints of edge pieces and corner pieces. If an actual jigsaw puzzle were put together under these conditions, would the participants have had any chance of success?"
This is where some red flags began poking up and waving around--not wildly, but just enough to raise my skeptical sense that something was amiss with this upcoming book by Harvard biologist Nathaniel Jeanson. For some reason the jigsaw puzzle struck me as odd, but I couldn't put my finger on why. I kept reading.
"Jeanson's book begins its account after the publication of the first edition of Darwin's book in 1859. Several years after Darwin made his bold claims, the Austrian monk Gregor Mendel, who studied inheritance and the origin of traits, published his discoveries, which remain textbook science to this day. In the early 1900s, American scientist Walter Sutton connected chromosomes to Mendel's decades' old discoveries. The next question for the scientific community was how specifically the chromosomes contained the information for traits. The search led to DNA and James Watson's and Francis Crick's famous discovery of the double helix in 1953."
So far so good; the text wasn't saying anything obviously scientifically incorrect, but it did seem to be bland and dancing around something. I just wasn't sure what... I read on:
"Jeanson concludes that there is much more to be discovered in this field, with the genetics of millions of species yet to be determined and the mutation rates of each of these species to be measured."
Okay, sounds right. I'm certain that no geneticist would disagree with Jeanson that "there is much more to be discovered in this field"; the same is true of virtually any scientific field. But the lede was buried in the very last two sentences:
"He expects that connections will be found between many other species within a family (or genus), but that species from different families (or genera) reside in completely different puzzles sharply disconnected from one another, rather than pointing to universal common ancestry. With this new book, the scientific revolution to overturn Darwin may have begun."
*Record scratch sound effect*
Hold on there. What exactly does "rather than pointing to universal common ancestry" mean? The implicit answer is in the next line: "With this new book, the scientific revolution to overturn Darwin may have begun." No common ancestor? Overturning Darwin?
Sounds a lot like Creationist Bullshit to me... and I realized why the jigsaw puzzle struck me as odd: it reminded me of bogus creationist analogies, such as the watchmaker analogy suggesting that a found watch must imply an intelligent designer.
But there was nothing in the press release that was explicitly Christian: no references to God, or the Bible, or intelligent design. It was all very subtle, just like "teach the controversy" suckers people into thinking there's a controversy about evolution.
So I looked up the publisher. It was not Harvard University Press but instead something called MasterBooks.com. A few seconds poking around the website revealed a trove of creationist pseudoscience, most of them with innocuous, sciencey-sounding titles like Earth's Catastrophic Past and Age of the Earth.
But there was also an ad for "Ken Ham Books and DVDs," along with the MasterBooks "100% Faith Grower Guarantee," which--whatever that means--is almost certainly as nonsensical as it sounds. I didn't fall for this gambit, but I had to admit that the anti-science agenda was pretty well hidden. It took me about five minutes before I was sure what was really going on--and that's probably about four minutes longer than most editors and journalists will give it. Jeanson and MasterBooks are hoping that enough of them order review copies and/or pass along the information about this potentially groundbreaking book without stopping to take a closer look at it.
In this age of social media and information sharing, it's more important than ever to be vigilant of misinformation. That goes for bogus news stories, but also for creationist books masquerading as cutting-edge genetic science.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

A decades-old murder in one of the strangest clown-related mysteries in history may have been solved.
I wrote about this odd story in my book Bad Clowns....
It happened in West Palm Beach in the spring of 1990 when a woman named Marlene Warren heard a knock on her door at 10:45 in the morning on May 26. She opened the door to find a whitefaced clown wearing a bright red nose and an orange wig. The clown greeted Warren with a wordless nod and handed her a basket of red and white carnations, along with two silver balloons. As Warren looked down at the gifts she was receiving, the clown pulled out a gun and shot her once point-blank in the mouth with either a .38 or a .357.
According to Warren’s son Joseph, who saw the shooting, the clown had brown eyes and wore Army boots. The clown escaped in a white Chrysler LeBaron, which was later reported stolen and discovered abandoned. Warren died two days later in the hospital. Detectives at the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office suspected her estranged husband Michael Warren of plotting the murder, along with a brown-eyed, brown-haired woman who worked for him repossessing cars for Mr. Warren’s auto dealership.
According to The Gainesville Sun, “A woman matching the description of Sheila Keen, 27, bought a clown costume, makeup, an orange wig and a red clown nose two days before the murder, according to two West Palm Beach costume store clerks who tentatively identified Keen’s photo from police files. Then, on the morning of the murder, a woman fitting Keen’s description purchased two balloons and a floral arrangement at a Publix supermarket less than a mile from Keen’s apartment, according to sheriff’s documents... The balloons and flowers match those left at the scene of the murder, according to the documents. Neighbors at Keen’s apartment complex in suburban West Palm Beach said they frequently spotted Michael Warren, the dead woman’s husband, at the complex, according to police reports.”
Both Mr. Warren and Keen denied any involvement, either romantically with each other or in the death of Warren’s wife. Keen claimed that she was out looking for cars to repossess at the time Mrs. Warren was shot. News of the killer clown shook the West Palm Beach community, and a news report dated a month after the shooting noted that “local adults and children are now apprehensive of businesses that employ [clowns]. ‘Unfortunately, children are only hearing the negative side,’ said Yvonne (Sunshine the Clown) Zarza, owner of Balloons Above the Palm Beaches. ‘Normally, it’s Don’t go near a stranger. Now parents are saying, Don’t go near clowns.’”
Warren stood trial in 1992 on 66 criminal counts of fraud, racketeering, and grand theft related to his business; on August 8 of that year he was convicted on over three dozen counts of fraud, grand theft, and petty theft.
For decades no one was arrested or charged in the death, but earlier this week that changed: According to CBS News, “Police in Florida say they've arrested a woman accused of dressing up like a clown 27 years ago and fatally shooting the wife of her future husband.
A Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office news release says 54-year-old Sheila Keen Warren was arrested Tuesday in Virginia. A Florida grand jury recently indicted her on a first-degree murder charge.” News reports suggest that DNA evidence led to Mrs. Warren’s arrest, though it’s not clear what items were recovered at the crime scene that would implicate Warren.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

For those who missed my recent appearance discussing my chupacabra investigation on Blackout w/ Samantha Scarlette, you can find it HERE!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

I'm quoted in Gizmodo on the topic of evil clowns, check it out HERE!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Thought I'd share a minor victory: A man who e-mailed me last week saying "My employee and myself spotted a Chupcabra yesterday afternoon in Vacaville, CA, a hairless cat/dog with a stubby tail and narrow body and head. A friend later that day showed me on the internet this Chupacabra and I recognized it as the same critter." I diplomatically suggested that he seemed to be describing a mangy animal, expecting to be ignored in favor of a sexy mystery. This morning he followed up: "I spoke with a local critter guy who told me that what I saw was probably a Bob cat or Lynx with mange. That is why I saw no hair or fur on the critter. It still looked very creepy."
Indeed; if these animals were easy to identify, there wouldn't be a mystery...
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

My new CFI blog on the return of Pennywise the evil clown!
Horror fans around the world have waited for years to see one of the most terrifying clowns in cinematic history, and finally Pennywise returns later this week in the new version of Stephen King's It.
As a post on Uproxx noted, "Who needs nightmares when you can be traumatized by creepy-ass clowns in person? The Alamo Drafthouse is celebrating the arrival of the 2017 cinematic take on Stephen King's It with a clown-only screening of the movie. The Austin location of the theater chain will cater to a clown-specific audience on September 9th with a special screening of It. All attendees are expected to be done up like a clown (I can count the Captain Spauldings already) and can also visit ‘an IT pre-party where we will have face-painters available for clown ‘touch-ups,' a photo booth, raffles for prizes, and other terrifying merriment.'"
You can read the rest HERE.

In Ep. 20 of Squaring the Strange we explore how urban legends can sometimes turn dangerous, and even deadly, from Slenderman to ebola rumors. And Celestia opens another fun fortune cookie! Get it while it's fresh HERE!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

The publisher of my book "Scientific Paranormal Investigation: How to Solve Unexplained Mysteries" tells me that orders for that book have shot up 60% in the past few weeks, and wondered why. Then I remembered that several college and university professors use my book as a classroom text. Thanks to all those teachers for using my work to spread critical thinking to students!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Several of my Skeptical Inquirer articles are referenced in the new Indiana University Press book UFOs, Chemtrails, and Aliens: What Science Says, by Don Prothero and Tim Callahan, with a foreword by Michael Shermer (you can see the book HERE). I can't want to read it!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

I'm quoted in the August 2017 Journal of Law and Social Deviance on the topic of evil clowns, which was the topic of a popular CSI Special Report last year. You can read the law journal article HERE.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

My Skeptical Inquirer article on online predators was recently referenced in the new MIT Press book Worried About the Wrong Things: Youth, Risk, and Opportunity in the Digital World, by Prof. Jacqueline Vickery of the University of North Texas!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

A researcher claimed that the chupacabra can be traced back to legends of the nightjar bird. I respectfully disagreed, which he then responded to, and which I then replied to. If you want to see two educated adults (one of them right and one of them wrong) kick each other's intellectual and metaphorical shins like kids on a playground over folkloric details of a mythical monster's naming and origin, here's your chance!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

I got a review copy of a new book from MIT Press and noticed that I'm quoted in it!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

I was recently interviewed for Voice of Islam’s Drivetime radio show, discussing Orwell’s book 1984 and its relevance to 2017. The topics ranged from Big Brother mass surveillance, concerns about public privacy, and the use of doublespeak in politics (including under the current U.S. president). You can hear the interview HERE.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Apparently my book "Bad Clowns" is frequently bought along with a book titled "Future Sex." I see my readers are optimists!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

For those who missed it and are interested in spending an entertaining and informative--or at least minimally objectionable--75 minutes, may I suggest the most recent episode of The Folklore Podcast, in which we discuss folklore of the chupacabra...
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

Soon after my recent appearance discussing folklore of the chupacabra (the topic of my book Tracking the Chupacabra: The Vampire Beast in Fact, Fiction, and Folklore), I got the following e-mail from a listener named James:
“I thought your appearance on The Folklore Podcast was very interesting and informative. It inspired me to search about chupacabras. One thing I came up with was about ‘Goat suckers’ and chotacabras. Too bad that I only have the 1997 version of the 1985 book The Jealous Potter by Claude Lévi-Strauss, but it sounds like there were a lot of myths/folklore about goat suckers in the folklore. Is there a reason you did not reference this in your book?”
I replied, “Thanks for reaching out to me, it’s good to hear from you. I’m glad you liked the Folklore Podcast interview, it was fun! Your question is a good one. I actually do briefly discuss the goatsucker bird in the first chapter of my book Tracking the Chupacabra (see page 4).
The chupacabra monster is very specifically a vampire: it sucks blood from its victims. The "goat sucker" bird that shares its name instead sucks milk from goats, which is a very different theme (there are few if any reports of surviving chupacabra victims, as the monster's actions are said to be lethal). Also the word chupacabra (as specifically describing the subject of my book) was, from all indications, coined in 1995 and referred specifically to rumors of goats being killed and drained of blood in rural Puerto Rico, not to the milk-drinking whippoorwill bird.
The main reason I didn’t go into much discussion about it is that as Levi-Strauss notes, stories about the bird are very diverse and difficult to classify (involving deities, marital jealousy, etc.). Other than one passing reference to a Tunuka Indian myth, there’s little or no vampiric aspect to it. As far as I know that’s the only reference to such blood sucking in The Jealous Potter, and in the quoted passage the attack is done by ghosts (souls of the dead), not the flesh-and-blood animal said to live on the island. Ghost folklore is interesting but not really relevant to the chupacabra I researched.
The coining of the word is, from my research, almost certainly a coincidence (chupacabra is an obvious coinage to describe anything said to prey on goats, regardless of its origin or nature). I suppose I could have added a few more sentences about the goat milk-drinking bird myths but since it wasn’t directly relevant to the chupacabra I was writing about (a supposedly real terrifying blood-sucking monster), I didn't want to take the reader too far off track. I hope that answers your question, and I appreciate The Jealous Potter reference, which I missed!”

Being interviewed for CNN on evil clowns. The show should air in a month or two!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo, and please check out my podcast Squaring the Strange!

My work has been included in the new edition of a university textbook on Abnormal Psychology. (No, I'm not a case study.) Cool!
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo.

I was recently interviewed by Vice media about my investigation into the 1997 Pokemon Seizure case.
I think the girl who got me a latte at my favorite coffee shop wasn't even born when I solved that mystery...
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo.

A Memphis mother calls police saying that her baby son was kidnapped by a Black man who stole her car. An Amber Alert was issued; police dogs, helicopters, and searchers scoured the area for hours--and find that her baby was never missing.
Skeptics and skeptical researchers routinely encounter and investigate a wide variety false reports: False reports of Bigfoot, UFOs, miracle healings, alien abductions, psychics, illnesses, and so on. I've personally investigated many such reports, including of phantom clowns (see my book Bad Clowns for more), racist conspiracy theories and legends (such as the Blood Libel anti-Jewish myth and anti-Muslim stories), and more. The xenophobic archetype of the evil outsider is ancient and takes on new forms. Understanding the psychology and motivations behind false reports can be enormously helpful. Some of them are hoaxes, but many are the result of sincere mistakes, misperceptions, and other cognitive errors.
When false reports concern "unexplained" topics (faked ghost sightings or UFO photos, for example), the result is usually just wasted time and the loss of credibility of a hoaxer or its proponents. However when false reports involve real-world subjects (for lack of a better term) they often implicate minorities and can result in miscarriages of justice. False reports of crimes, for example, are often used as a weapon against minorities.
You may recall Susan Smith, the mother who in 1994 blamed an African-American man for kidnapping her children when she in fact drowned them in a lake. Or Jennifer Wilbanks, the so-called "Runaway Bride" who claimed to have been kidnapped and assaulted by a Hispanic man, but who had in fact voluntarily left her groom at the altar. Or the infamous Central Park Five case, in which five Black and Latino teenagers were arrested in 1989 for the brutal rape and assault of a white jogger in New York's Central Park. Many people--including Donald Trump and African-American poet Sapphire (author of Push, from which the Oscar-winning film Precious was adapted)--jumped on the bandwagon falsely accusing the young men of the crime. The list goes on and on... and continues today.
For a more in-depth analysis see my CFI blog HERE.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo.

For centuries rumors circulated about an ancient lost city—not Atlantis but a “White City” of immense wealth hidden in the Honduran jungles of Central America. Myths of treasure and every imaginable curse run rampant—but the fact that the city existed somewhere out in the jungles was widely accepted by Hondurans.
I attended a talk by Doug Preston, about his research and new book The Lost City of the Monkey God—at Albuquerque’s historic KiMo theater, whose resident ghost I investigated and debunked several years ago (as described in the first chapter of my book Mysterious New Mexico)—and followed up with a telephone interview, excerpted here.
Radford: You seem to have a knack for finding yourself in the middle of fascinating mysteries and real-life adventures, between the deadly jungles of The Lost City and The Monster of Florence, where you’re tangling with a serial killer. Most writers lead a fairly sedentary life—why are you different?
Preston: “Well I think it’s probably a little bit of stupidity there [laughing]. I find myself falling into my own stories, like with The Monster of Florence I started off thinking I was writing a story about these long-ago crimes in Florence, these serial killings, but all of a sudden we [Preston and his co-author Mario Spezi] got pulled in by the police investigation, and pretty soon I was being interrogated as a suspect... it was really crazy.”
Radford: As you talk about in the book, finding the Lost City came at a great cost, both in terms of the expedition, your health, and other factors. Can you talk about what went into finding it?
Preston: “The legend of the Lost City did talk about the city being cursed, that all who went in there would become sick and die, and so forth. And of course I completely dismissed those legends. Well it turns out that part of the legend is kind of based on the truth, and that is that the valley is a hotzone of disease, and two-thirds of the expedition came down with this really serious tropical disease called mucocutaneous leishmaniasis. It’s incurable, I’ll have it for the rest of my life, and it’s really quite an awful disease. But I’m getting excellent treatment.”
Radford: You talk about some of the myths and legends surrounding the city; where did they come from?
Preston: “These legends and stories really date back about 500 years to the time of Cortez. He wrote a famous letter in 1526 while he was in Honduras to the emperor Charles V and reported that he’d heard very reliable information of a wonderful and rich civilization in the interior of Honduras, very wealthy and rich an advanced culture, and ever since then there have been legends and stories about this lost city, sometimes called the White City, Ciudad Blanca, sometimes called the Lost City of the Monkey God, somewhere in these mountains. A number of people have looked for it, and some have actually died in the search...Like most legends, it’s based on the truth, it’s based on the fact that there was a great civilization in this area that actually built more than one city.”
Radford: Let me touch on some of the challenges to writers and science popularizers when reporting a story such as this. There’s always a tension between wanting to communicate complex ideas in science, anthropology, archaeology, and so on to the public, but not overly sensationalize them. You touch on that in your book, expressing a bit of reluctance about calling it a “lost city” in the vein of Indiana Jones, but in the end you have to get people’s attention.
Preston: “Well, this is something that you as a science journalist know about very well... As you mentioned, you have to strike a balance between writing a heavy and scientific tome which nobody will read except scientists, or going too much in the other direction and writing something that’s so frivolous and non-factual that you’ve really done a very great disservice to the science. I try to occupy the middle ground. Everything in the book is accurate, nothing is made up, everything has been very carefully vetted—but it is exciting, this is a sensational discovery.... As for using language like the ‘lost city,’ well it is a city and it is lost! I know some archaeologists have said, ‘Oh, that’s just Indiana Jones hype’ but in fact it isn’t hype. It is actually real and it is quite exciting, and I want to convey that excitement to the reader without burdening them with a lot of scientific jargon.”
Read the rest of the interview HERE.
You can find more on me and my work with a search for "Benjamin Radford" (not "Ben Radford") on Vimeo.